Category: Policy

The refugee crisis we are facing today and have been facing for the past, almost, four years has no precedent. Since 2015 when the whole madness started, when over one million refugees, displaced persons and other migrants came to Europe to find shelter and escape from the conflicts and wars in their countries, our continent became the host for other 65 million people, the number rising with the time passing by.

All these people that have arrived here after land or sea journeys require basic humanitarian assistance, such as provision of clean water, health care, emergency shelter and legal aid. Many of these displaced people are children who have special protection needs.

The European Commission has taken a comprehensive approach to tackle the refugee crisis in Europe with the European Agenda for Migration, drawing on the various tools and instruments available at the European level and in the member states. The special department of the European Commission for humanitarian and civil protection supports refugees and their host communities in four ways:

Looking at data from the European Commission, the European institution that has a humanitarian and civil protection special department to support refugees, there are four ways in which this process is done: the European Commission provides emergency support, the European Union funding with €83 million in Greece for shelter, food, hygiene, child friendly spaces, education, family reunification assistance and protection; it helps transit countries with humanitarian funding; it puts the European Union Civil Protection Mechanism at the disposal of member states and neighbouring countries; and it scales up humanitarian aid for major crises.

Talking about the European Union Civil Protection Mechanism, when looking for information about it and different data related to it and its mission, I could conclude that some member states really contributed with donations for the refugee camps in Greece, while others contributed from very little to not at all. Through the countries that step foot in this situation, we can mention the United Kingdom, Sweden, Spain, Slovenia, Slovakia, Portugal, Norway, the Netherlands, Malta, Luxemburg, Lithuania, Latvia, Hungary, Germany, France, Finland, Czech Republic, Cyprus, Belgium, or Austria. Poland, on the other hand, hasn’t donated anything at all, or Hungary donated only 1000 beds. Everything I mentioned in this paragraph has an explanation that I will provide later in this research.

Looking over the Eurostat data, I could observe the asylum applicants’ number by year and by sex. The first thing that I observed was that most applicants were men, only half of them or even a quarter being women in every year (starting with 2008 and ending with 2017, the period on which the data was collected). Also, when it comes to the number of people who applied for asylum, the charter looks like this: starting with 2008, when there were 5150 applicants, the number increased significantly. In 2009 we already had 63835 applicants and in 2015 there were 1322825 applicants. The number started decreasing in 2016 with 1260910 and in 2017, 705705.

Eurostat also collected data on the number of first time asylum applicants for each country, and what we can easily observe in their table is that Germany had the most applicants from 2008 to 2017, followed by France on the second place and by Italy on the third. The last three states to have asylum applicants were Liechtenstein, Estonia and Latvia. A conclusion that we can draw from here is that the applicants tend to go in more developed countries where they know they can have a better life, especially from an economic point of view. Also, these countries like Germany or France have always expressed their willingness of welcoming refugees in need. Of course countries like Liechtenstein, Estonia or Latvia won’t have such a big number of applicants and one of the reasons why I think this happens is because of the geographical position: Estonia and Latvia, for example, are right at the border with Russia and they might not be considered the safest place or the most welcoming for refugees. The third Baltic country, Lithuania, didn’t have many applicants either: 4220.

As some countries are more welcoming, some states don’t want refugees to cross their borders at all, and I will give a few examples before explaining that with more details:

1. Bulgaria – as a result of Greece’s diversion of migrants to Bulgaria from Turkey, Bulgaria built its own fence to block migrants crossing from Turkey;[footnoteRef:1] [1: Sarah Almukhtar; Josh Keller; Derek Watkins (16 October 2015). ‘Closing the Back Door to Europe’. The New York Times]
2. Macedonia – in August 2015, a police crackdown on migrants crossing from Greece failed in Macedonia, causing the police to instead turn their attention to diverting migrants north, into Serbia. In November 2015, Macedonia began erecting a fence along its southern border with Greece, with the intention of channelling the flow of migrants though an official checkpoint as opposed to limiting the inflow of migrants; [footnoteRef:2] [2: Costas Kantouris; Konstantin Testorides (28 November 2015). ‘Migrants clash with Macedonian police on Greek border’]
3. Hungary – the country built a 175 km razor-wire fence along its border with Serbia in 2015; it also built a 40 km razor-wire fence along its border with Croatia in 2015, and on October 16, 2015 Hungary announced that it would close off its border with Croatia to migrants;[footnoteRef:3] [3: Sarah Almukhtar; Josh Keller; Derek Watkins (16 October 2015). ‘Closing the Back Door to Europe’. The New York Times]
4. Slovenia – it blocked transit from Croatia in September 2015, pepper spraying migrants trying to cross. Although re-opening the border, Slovenia restricted crossing to 2,500 migrants per day;[footnoteRef:4] [4: Radul Radovanovic (18 October 2015). ‘Thousands stranded on new migrant route through Europe’. The Associated Press, MSN]
5. Norway – on 25 January, it was reported that Russia closed its northern border checkpoint with Norway for asylum seekers to return to Russia; [footnoteRef:5] [5: ‘Russia shuts arctic border to Norway over ′security reasons′ (24.01.2016) ‘ . DW.COM.]
6. Finland – on 4 December, Finland temporarily closed its land border crossing by lowering the border gate and blocking the road with a car. On 27 December 2015, Finland closed its Russian border for people riding on bicycles, reportedly enforcing the rule only on Raja-Jooseppi and Salla checkpoints. Earlier, more and more asylum seekers had crossed the border on bikes. [footnoteRef:6] [6: ‘TASS: World – Finnish border guards block 15 Mideast, African immigrants in Russia’s Murmansk region’. TASS.]

REFUGEES HUMAN RIGHTS

The next section of my research will be based on refugees’ rights so I can later compare that to how they are actually treated and how the states are behaving about it (state policies). I will start by speaking about the UNHCR, being The UN Refugee Agency, governed by the UN General Assembly and the Economic and Social Council.

They work in 138 countries around the world, from major capitals to remote and often dangerous locations. Wherever refugees arrive, they work closely with governments to ensure the 1951 Refugee Convention, that defines the term “refugee” and outlines the rights of the displaces, as well as the legal obligations of states to protect them, is honoured.

Unregulated migration is not safe, as it can have serious implications for regional security and stability, and that’s why it is also called the “uncontrolled migration”. It can strain the integrity of asylum systems and fuel public hostility towards all foreign nationals, regardless of their legal status. It can also lead to restrictive border controls which may fail to address the rights and needs of persons on the move, including refugees’ right to seek international protection, and which may result in refoulement or human rights violations. UNHCR therefore strives to engage with migration issues that affect refugees and other persons under its mandate, including asylum-seekers, internally displaced people and stateless people. In certain circumstances, the General Assembly has asked UNHCR to contribute its expertise to processes that relate to migration. UNHCR focusses broadly on seeking the particular protection the asylum-seekers, refugees and stateless people need; assisting states to meet asylum and migration-management challenges; identifying migration, trafficking and related development impacting on people under UNHCR’s mandate; and supporting stronger governance and closer observance of the universal character of human rights that clearly states the right of all people on the move, regardless of their legal status. [footnoteRef:7] [7: https://www.unhcr.org/]

Their primary purpose is to safeguard the rights and well-being of people who have been forced to flee. Together with partners and communities, they work to ensure that everybody has the right to seek asylum and find safe refuge in another country. They also strive to secure lasting solutions. For over half a century, UNHCR has helped millions of people to restart their lives. They include refugees, returnees, stateless people, the internally displaced and asylum seekers. Their protection, shelter, health and education had been crucial, healing broken pasts and building brighter futures. [footnoteRef:8] [8: https://www.unhcr.org/]

We can also find information about refugee rights in the “Asylum & The Rights of Refugees” section of the International Justice Resource Centre. Among their rights, we can mention: “the right to seek and be granted asylum in a foreign territory, in accordance with the legislation of the state and international conventions”; the right not to be returned by a state to “the frontiers of territories where his life or freedom would be threatened on account of his race, religion, nationality, membership of particular social group or political opinion”; the right to life and freedom from torture, the right to liberty and security of the person; and the right of a family life as it is “the natural and fundamental group unit of society and is entitled to protection by society and the State”. They also have access to the courts, to afford the same treatment as nationals while with others, such as wage-earning employment and property rights, and to afford the same treatment as foreign nationals. Despite these rights being protected and under human rights treaties, refugees in various states do not fully enjoy the legal protection of fundamental privileges. If one of the refugees is considered a danger to the national security of the host country then the rights are not applied anymore. [footnoteRef:9] [9: https://ijrcenter.org/refugee-law/]

As I mentioned earlier, the rights of the refugees are not respected everywhere and not all countries are welcoming with the refugees, even if they are members of the organizations that protect refugees and the laws related to them. In the next section of my research I will take a few examples of countries and their state policies on refugees, migration and asylum seeking.

SWEDEN

For the beginning, I will quote from Sweden’s migration and asylum policy found in a Fact Sheet of the Ministry of Justice and published in February 2018:

“The Government’s objective is to ensure a sustainable migration policy that safeguards the right of asylum and, within the framework of managed immigration, facilitates mobility across borders, promotes demand-driven labour migration, harnesses and takes account of the development impact of migration, and deepens European and international cooperation. This fact sheet outlines the Government’s current work in this area.

Sweden has shouldered a great deal of responsibility in the ongoing global refugee situation. The Government took a series of temporary measures to significantly reduce the number of people seeking asylum in Sweden when the EU Member States were unable to share the responsibility that came with the large number of asylum seekers. The Government decided to introduce temporary border controls at internal borders. (…) On 20 July 2016, a temporary act was introduced bringing Sweden’s asylum rules in line with minimum standards under EU law. Under this act, persons eligible for subsidiary protection are granted temporary residence permits and opportunities for family reunification are limited. The limitations do not apply to quote refugees. (…) In 2017, approximatively 2800 people who applied for asylum in Greece or Italy were relocated to Sweden under a 2015 EU decision. In the second half of 2015, a large number of unaccompanied minors came to Sweden. Most unaccompanied minors seeking asylum in Sweden are granted a residence permit. If the authorities conclude that the minor has no grounds for staying in Sweden, the basic premise is that the minor should return to their country of origin. This return is conditional on proper reception being in place. (…) To maintain a sustainable asylum and migration policy, it is crucial that people who have received a final and non-appealable refusal-of-entry or expulsion order following a legally certain examination of their grounds for asylum return to their country of origin as quickly as possible. The Government has implemented many measures to increase returns. For example, the rights to accommodation and financial assistance no longer apply to adults who are not living with a child when a refusal-of-entry or expulsion order has become final and non-appealable.”[footnoteRef:10]. [10: https://www.government.se/information-material/2018/02/swedens-migration-and-asylum-policy/]

Sweden has announced that it will change its current legislation only once a working common European Union asylum policy is in place. Such reform has not been forthcoming, and it is unclear whether it ever will, amid deep divisions between the southern states that initially receive the migrants, the eastern states that would preferably like to close the door for asylum seekers entirely, and the northern states where asylum seekers are keen to go. If inaction prevails, the next step for Member States such as Sweden might very well be to ask themselves whether it makes sense to have an European Union policy on these matters. The failure of European asylum policy may be the lead to further disintegration in the European Union. [footnoteRef:11] [11: https://www.migrationpolicy.org/article/sweden-turns-welcoming-and-restrictive-its-immigration-policy]

FRANCE

In the Refugee Law and Policy of France, it is mentioned the following: “France has a long tradition of offering asylum to foreign refugees, and the right of asylum has constitutional value under the French law. French asylum law is heavily based on International and European law, but is largely codified in the Code of Entry and Residence of Foreigners and of the Right of Asylum. There are two types of protection in France: refugee protection and subsidiary protection. (…) Asylum may be denied or revoked for individuals who have committed crimes or whose presence would be a threat to society or national security. Refugees and beneficiaries of subsidiary protection have the right to live and work in France, and to bring their spouse and children. Those granted refugee status can apply to be naturalized as French citizens immediately. Refugees and beneficiaries of subsidiary protection have the right to obtain travel documents from the French government. Refugees and beneficiaries of subsidiary protection are required to attend some civic training programs and, if necessary, language classes. Refugees and beneficiaries of subsidiary protection have similar rights to social benefits as French citizens do, but only have access to certain special aid programs during the time that their application for asylum is being processed. (…) Refugees gain the right to a residency permit, which is valid for an initial term of ten years and can then be renewed for an indefinite term. (…) Refugees and beneficiaries of subsidiary protection have similar rights to social benefits as French citizens. They are covered by the French universal health insurance scheme, for example, and they may get various social welfare benefits (guaranteed minimum income, family subsidies, access to social housing, etc.) under the same conditions as French citizens.”[footnoteRef:12] [12: https://www.loc.gov/law/help/refugee-law/france.php]

Researching even more into the French government documents, I found out that lately France has been taking steps towards making their own policy more effective. There they are in favour of a solidary-based mechanism for allocation based on the status of asylum-seekers, which would factor in the contributions of countries to date. France’s contribution in recent years is significant: they took in 5000 Syrian and 4500 Iraqi refugees since 2012. They will continue to do so in the hope that their efforts will be replicated elsewhere. The French Government hopes that, “starting with Frontex in Italy, the distinction will be made between asylum-seekers, who can then benefit from this solidarity-based system of allocation, and those who must be returned to the border.”

Last year though, a new Immigration Bill has been introduced and this time it was not that friendly with the asylum-seekers or refugees. One of the reasons why I think this bill has been published is because France became a chaotic country that is considered by some a place with no nationality anymore, just like Sweden, where there are little French and more people that only need a place to stay. This new legislation includes plans to: introduce fines of $4620 or a 1-year jail term for people who illegally cross borders within not only France, but the European Union; double the time asylum-seekers can be held in detention to 90 days; share equally the amount of the time asylum-seekers have to appeal if their refugee status is denied; hurry the deportation of those asylum-seekers deemed to be economic migrants, and cut the average waiting time on asylum applications from 11 to 6 months.

There were many controversially opinions on how the European Union is divided by refugees policies. The issue of migration is becoming a bigger problem because the East takes different actions than the West. One time there was a quota resolution discussed and that should’ve been put in practice since September 2015 by the European Union members, but now that quota is dead. More countries, especially from the Eastern parts of Europe, refuse refugees to cross their borders, and about that I will discuss in the next paragraph of my research.

HUNGARY AND POLAND

Now that I discussed about two countries that have been more than welcoming with refugees and asylum-seekers, losing their “nationalities”, as some opinions say, I want to explain what is happening in the Eastern part of Europe, where states are not so welcoming, a thing that caused several discussions and pressures at a European level. These two countries are two of the best examples of how a state can refuse to respect human rights of people in need and any European law that was, theoretically, taken at the Union level and should’ve been respected by all member states.

The border between Hungary and Serbia is one of the most fortified, a tall fence running along its length electrified, topped with thick swirls of razor wire and patrolled by police. At official “transit zones”, heavily guarded and closed to journalists and rights activists, just one person per day is allowed to enter to officially begin the asylum process. They will live in shipping containers locked inside the zone for months while the legal process is under way. In Poland, opinion polls show that about 3-quarters of Poles are against accepting refugees from Africa and the Middle East. One of the reasons why they refuse to do that is because, as it was related in an interview with Gazeta Polska Codziennie, Poland “would have to completely change their culture and radically lower the level of safety in their country”.

The European Commission is not amused by this: they want to sue Poland, Hungary, and even Czech Republic at the European Court of Justice for refusing to take in asylum seekers. The Luxembourg-based ECJ could impose heavy fines. The Czech Republic has accepted only 12 of the 2000 asylum-seekers it had been designated, while Hungary and Poland have received none. Even Romania is among the countries that voted against accepted mandatory quotes, like the ones of 2015 when states agreed to relocate 160000 asylum-seekers between them.

Introduction to China’s One Child Policy

In this Essay, I analyze the ethics of the One Child Policy and how this regime-mandated population rule influences the people living in China. This essay commences with a summary of the rule with the historic background of the rule and how it used to be applied. Then I attempt into presenting one unintended consequence that has been caused by the “one child’s policy” of (Fong’s, 2016) book and present other authors’ views backed with evidence that supports my argument. I am expanding a range of sources to obtain a perception of the One Child Policy and how its implementation has affected the nation. Another interesting argument by (Nanfu Wang, 2019) has announced an interesting documentary that used subjective testimony to highlight the increased apprehensions of the One Child Policy. I used this documentary as an inspiration of power for what issues and penalties of the rule to examine deep through the policy. There are themes to be presented such as implementation and the families, women, and kids affected by the policy.

I will then present the personal stories and experiences of the individuals effected by the policy and that have been used worldwide by international specialists such as the and the western journalism, World Health Organization and United Nations, researchers like the Atlantic and the New York Times, and peer examined theoretical sources. Furthermore, it is essential to notice that I could not find consistent research articles from Chinese sources itself and on several occasions, there was no confidential data to rely on, that is because to a lack of report preserving or falsified certification, in these instances, I focus on individual testimony and exclusive illustrations to examine the situations and the rule has put citizens in. I apprehend that this does now not point out how massive these capabilities are inside China. Nevertheless, supposing that these topics are telling the reality it acts as precise substantial to have a look at the moral apprehensions of the policy.

Ethical Implications and Unintended Consequences

The essay will illustrate the penalties of China’s One Child rule and the moral apprehensions that demand to be viewed when imposing a national policy and an unintended scenario that has been caused due to some important factors that will be brough in discussion and considerations. There are reasons why the policy was adopted, therefore, I will use more than one factor to show how it has led to an unintended scenario. According to journalist Mei Fong in her book One Child: The Story of China’s Most Radical Experiment. A woman during the 2016 Beijing Olympics stands in the middle of the Olympic village with a sign, written on it says “I just want to go to school”. She is quickly forcibly removed by police and the bustle of the Olympics continues. She returns every day with her sign just to be removed within minutes. According to Fong and the small amount of coverage of this protestor, there are people in China who are undocumented in their own country of birth. These lost children are a result of high fines for unapproved second children that can range to be four times the annual income of a family, resulting in them growing up legally not be recognized by China (Fong 2016). Assuming she is correct, the inability of this portion of the population to gain legal recognition creates numerous effects including no access to education and healthcare as well as the inability to get a job. These consequences are entangled with major ethical concerns.This is all a result of one of the main regulatory tools of the One Child Policy being large fines as punishment for those who have more than one child. However, these fines are so large that they can be completely debilitating and result in families unable to pay. Without being to pay the fine the child can never be registered and is left legally not existing. With a financial barrier being a major deterrent for breaking the One Child policy, it lends to the idea of how a policy like this unequally affects those of low socioeconomic backgrounds and creates a greater burden for those disenfranchised.

The star system is a visual and public reward system that pressures both local government and households to embody ideals and reach the numerical goals of the state. For individual families, the stars represent and reward them for what makes a good Chinese citizen, including a star for having only one child (Fong 2016). This use of a reward system creates a culture of pride and motivation. China is a society that values the collective and visually being able to show that you are playing your role for the collective by not having more than one child. This can also act as a negative reinforcement for those who cannot achieve that star. When a family has more than one child they do not earn that star and it is a public marker that they did not play their part in the collective and create shame for not conforming to the policy even if they got approval for a second child (Wang 2019). Visual reinforcement of the One Child policy was a successful tool in making the actions of a community member the responsibility of the entire community.

Public Health Interventions and Nationalist Campaigns

The first factor was a public health intervention and Mao’s major health campaigns that played on Chinese nationalism overall, having a critical role in reducing mortality rates in China. Public health campaigns and efforts became popular all over the world making the quality of life and health better; however, Maoist China was able to use the nationalist spirit to implement them under the title “Patriotic Health Campaigns” (Babiarz et al. 2015). The 1950s had some of the first public health campaigns focused on sanitation, this included proper disposing of excrement, eradicating pests linked to major health issues: rats, fleas, mosquitos, and bed bugs, and refusal of amputation of the body that leads to greater infection (Jamison 1984; Banister 1987; Hipgrave 2011). As time went on Mao took these sanitation standards and expanded them throughout the country including rural areas. Within Maoist China came new innovations in life-saving vaccines. These vaccines include polio, measles, diphtheria, whooping cough, scarlet fever, cholera, and smallpox, which in the case of smallpox was distributed rapidly and widespread to that it was completely eradicated by 1960 with the last cases being in Tibet and Yunnan (Jamison 1984; Banister 1987). Finally, in order to address high infant and maternal mortality rates, most of China’s midwives were retrained in the 1950s under the ‘modern midwifery’ campaign, which had a high emphasis on the importance of sanitation during childbirth (Banister 1987).

Human Trafficking and Adoption Scandals

The Dunan family is a group in China that was arrested and convicted for human trafficking abandoned babies to orphanages. In 2005, Dunan Yuangeng was wrapped in the 2005 scandal where it was revealed that six orphanages in Hunan, one of the largest suppliers to western adoption centers, were found to have been buying babies (Fong 2016). Dunan Yuangeng and his family were placed in jailed labor for the trafficking of 85 infants, but the reality is they were involved in many more adoptions. They would take these babies in milk powder boxes and travel 600 miles from Guanfonf to Hunan to deliver them to the orphanages (Fong 2016). According to Dunan Yuangeng, he estimates that he alone had sold at least 1,000 babies to orphanages, whether it be from families giving them the infant or being informed that an infant was abandoned in a public place (Tong 2010). He was only charged for 85 infants because it was common practice for the orphanages to falsify documents, as a result making it nearly impossible to track where these babies are from, resulting in thousands of people having no way to know where they came from or under what circumstances they were put up for adoption. China has claimed that no babies that were adopted by Americans were involved in this scandal. The reality is there is already evidence that people adopted to America from several different provinces and adoption centers have been connected to Dunan and the various ways adoption centers have falsified their records.

Though the selling and lying about babies is clearly unethical, the reality is the reason it grew to the international criminal empire is all due to the demand for healthy babies. Americans and other high-income counties were creating a high demand to adopt babies giving a “donation” of around $3,000 and by 2009 rising to $5,000, resulting in orphanages receiving annual donations of about $300,000 to $500,000 making this a lucrative source of income for the orphanage and their employees (Stuy 2014). As a result, the orphanages were adopting out infants quickly and they were trying to restock their numbers and that is where these human traffickers got involved. The Duncan Matriarch said the orphanage, in the beginning, would pay them $120 a baby and as they reached the early 2000’s they would be paid $250 and by 2005 they got $500 a baby (Fong 2016). When there are not a lot of ways to make money and the alternative is abandonment or infanticide many families and individuals like Dunans would enter the illegal selling of babies to these orphanages.

Sterilization Policies and Women’s Reproductive Rights

Sterilization ensured life-long birth control when compared to the pill and the IUD. Sterilization itself is not a bad thing if the woman chooses it without coercion or force. However in China that was not the reality. One of the methods villages and their family planning officers used to slow the growth of their population and not exceed their government allotted birth rate was to require all women to be sterilized after the birth of their first and only child. This is because the village leaders and the larger Chinese government did not trust people with the choice and control of nonpermanent methods of birth control (Fong 2016). Even places like the city of Yicheng, which had a more flexible two-child policy, required women to get sterilized as their main form of birth control and they had to have their second child no earlier than 5 years after the first or risk high fines or coerced abortions (Fong 2016).

The other way the One Child policy has violated a woman’s reproductive rights by removing their ability to choose what they can do with their body is the practice of forced abortion. When a woman gets pregnant and they are not approved to have that child, local government, and family planning authorities used similar methods of coercion as they did for the sterilization of women. Local government leaders like Haung Denggao admit to using persuasive tactics like large fines and the confiscation of valuables to persuade women to get abortions. Not only would these children be aborted, but sometimes the midwife or doctor would induce labor to deliver the baby and kill it (Wang 2019). In this case, women were being coerced into abortion meaning they lost their right to choose what they can do with their bodies. China has some of the most open accessibility for women to get abortions as a means of reducing the population as a part of the open accessibility for family planning resources that came with the One Child policy (Dixon-Muelller 1993). With a lack of regulation by the national government on how to enforce the policy, it has resulted in the coercion of women to abort the children unwanted by the government (Li 2012).

Effects of the One Child Policy on the Chinese and the World Economy

China’s quick and impending increase in median age over upcoming decades definitely will not be helping its economic growth, which is ironic because economic growth is one of the reasons why the policy was created and adopted by the government in the first place. At some point in the near future, the amount of peopleretiring and leaving the workforce may exceed the amount of people graduating from school and entering it. According to Vikram Masharamani’s article“ Is China’s One Child Policy to Blame for its Economic Slowdown,”one of the main factors that drives a country’s economic growth is its labor force, which means when more people enter the workforce, it brings more money into the economy and increased productivity. By 2035,20 percent of the population will be 65 or over, so this “labor-driven growth” will not be occurring in China. From the 1980s until 2010, with China’s pre one-child policy, babyboomer generation working to their fullest capacities, China was able to achieve double-digit increases in its GDP growth rates and moved past Japan to officially become the world’s second largest economy (Baozhen). These same workers who helped change China from a struggling communist nation into an economic powerhouse are quickly approaching their 60s and 70s, and can only work for so much longer. The problem is, they do not have many children of their own to replace them, and so China may have to say goodbye to its rapidly increasing GDP.

Conclusion: Reflecting on the One Child Policy’s Legacy

In conclusion, the One Child policy technically was a success, it reduced the population growth of China. However, in the process, it sacrificed the health of their demographics and the human rights of their people. China and its population policy reveal that when controlling a population and people’s reproduction rate, even with the best intentions has unintended consequences. In the case of China, the mission was to simply limit people to one child in order to avoid resource depletion and economic ruin. It was an ideal case study because it was a policy that was created by its own government and was the most strict form of a population policy that was widely applied to a large population. China and its collective society and the authoritative government still had to face cultural barriers and limitations to its ability to get people to follow the policy resulting in ethical violations against the people of China and the creation of new demographic issues.

Policy Network Analysis is emerging as an innovative management practice. It has the potential to promote good governance. A network approach to the public policy-making process is beneficial to government as well as non-governmental actors who are not always represented. In the modern world, an incompetent policy-making process is not ideal. Inefficiency widens the gap between governmental and non-governmental policy actors. This is why a strategic measure ought to be adopted by the government in order to be representative of all groups. Citizen engagement that is monitored is essential.

Policy making has always been hierarchical and traditional hence it is time to adopt new approaches. The process of public policy-making ought to be representative of the interests of all stakeholders. In order to ensure that the government creates policies that are efficient and effective, policy network analysis has been adopted by some countries. As a result, they have managed to achieve policy goals, facilitate policy influence, and strengthen their political weight due to the numbers involved in this process.

The problem of inefficient policies is a result of an incompetent public policy-making process. In some stages of the policy-making process, some stakeholders or groups are excluded from the decision making especially women, children, and minor interest groups. The inefficiency calls for the policymakers to redress the situation so as to ensure that participatory policy-making and engagement of all citizens are adhered to. It is essential to harness the policies through informed and comprehensive strategies that do not marginalize any group (Koma, 2013).

Furthermore, it is noteworthy that a networked approach to policy making fosters citizen engagement which is the best strategy that the government should make sure that it is highly effective (Obasi & Lekorwe, 2014:3). It helps in strengthening a sound investment in the relationship between all groups hence creating quality policies. This approach highlights why it is important to deal with the inefficiency of policies and the process by which they are made. It is important to harness communication between all policy actors at the initial stage of policy making. Consultation has to be both bottom-up and top-down. Free and interactive communication and thorough consensus among diverse policy community helps remove formal barriers in the formulation and implementation stages. This creates a collaborative relationship among all stakeholders.

With respect to other countries that have adopted this approach, Australia and New Zealand are at the forefront with their success stories. They have both devolved authority to citizen and local government stakeholders (Kootz, 2006:459). The United States is also successful in policy network analysis as it has made efforts to be inclusive and participatory by involving the different stakeholders in all the stages of policy making. An example is seen in their environmental policy. Huairou Commission had also initially excluded women’s groups from global level decision-making. However, the commission then adopted a network approach where over 11000 women’s groups at grassroots levels were given a platform to participate in the public policy-making process (Perkin & Court, 2005:3).

This study reviewed Botswana’s policy-making process by synthesizing existing literature. According to Marumo (2017:2) government of Botswana provides a few opportunities for public engagement and participation in the policy-making process. A documentary study was used to identify the three key research objectives. They are; why the network approach works, how the approach influences the policy-making process, and lessons for capacity building were identified. The networked approach was specifically analyzed to help identify a suitable strategy to assist the government in creating policies that are representative of all groups.

Creating a link between all stakeholders has quantifiable benefits and opportunities that the government should adopt. Due to policy network analysis, the general citizenry stands a better chance of being heard instead of depending on their political representative to make decisions on their behalf (Perkin & Court, 2005:5). This approach is a tool that bridges the gap between the marginalized groups and those at the center of the policy-making process. In addition, involving multiple stakeholders helps build a trustworthy government thus promoting democracy (Obasi & Lekorwe, 2014:3). All these are reasons why it is essential to embark on this approach as it is better than any other approach that has been used to create policies.

Industrialized countries have managed to adopt a networked approach in their public policy-making process (Kootz, 2005:466). Botswana as a developing country stands in a good stance as it has theorized a few efforts to involve some groups but an inclusive and representative policy-making process is a strategic way of improving the usage of national resources and promoting good governance at all levels.

Citizen engagement and participation are essential in policy creation. When planning for development, all the affected parties should be given a platform to debate and give opinions on policy issues and solutions. This includes those at the periphery as they tend to be the most alienated when the numerous policies are formulated and processed through all the phases. Participants must be allowed to actively take part in policy-making for they are the beneficiaries of the development that follows the implementation of such policies (Obasi & Lekorwe, 2014). The government ought to develop a comprehensive communication strategy and educate all stakeholders about their importance in decision-making. Another key message is promoting creativity and consensus among the different groups as well as noting that informal links between government and those at the periphery are very important in achieving policy goals and commitments.

It is imperative to maximize the policy network analysis as it has proven to bring more opportunities for citizen engagement and participation. When the gap that exists in the public policy-making process is left unattended, it could and will bring negative implications. A centralized public policy-making process compromises the principle of democracy. Furthermore, the implemented policies may continue failing to reach the set target because knowledge management from all stakeholders was neglected thus policy issues will prevail despite efforts made by just the governmental actors.

As a result, there are key policy options that the government should adopt in an effort to re-engineer the current public policy-making process. Strengthening enabling factors for optimizing the policy network analysis. Marumo (2017:4) is of the view that more emphasis should be put on pilot mechanisms for public members, and officials to exchange ideas on the policy-making process. This can be done by holding legislative hearings. In these hearings, the general membership is given an opportunity to debate policy issues. Moreover, the government must plan for quality education about the process of public policy at all levels.

References

1. Koma, G. P. (2013). A Policy Network Analysis of the Implementation of the Comprehensive Africa Development Program. 3 November, 1-81. Durban, KwaZulu Natal, South Africa: University of KwaZulu Natal.
2. Kootz, T. M. (2005). We Finished the Plan, So Now What? Impacts ofCollaborative Stakeholder Participation on Land Use Policy. The Policy Studies Jornal , 33 (3), 459-481.
3. Marumo, O. (2017). Open Budget Survey. Gaborone. Retrieved from http://www.openbudgetsurvey.org on 20th October
4. Obasi, I. N., & Lekorwe, M. H. (2014). Citizen Engagement in Public Policy Making Process in Africa: The Case of Botswana. Public Policy and Administration Research: International Journal, 3 (4), 1-11.
5. Perkin, E., & Court, J. (2005, August 5). Networks and Policy Processes in International Development: a literature review. Retrieved September 16, 2019, from Open Data Institute Website: http://www.odi.org.uk/cspp.

Social policy focuses on human needs, social issues, social welfare, equity, and social justice. These concepts are drawn from a range of different subjects such as sociology, law, politics, psychology, economics, and philosophy. Seen to be a field of study, as well as a form of practice. Governments can best distribute resources to provide and deliver welfare facilities, services, and opportunities to meet human needs, enhance social wellbeing and maximize social justice.

Social policy can be found in all areas of society; workplaces, education, the media, family dynamics, healthcare, and communities to mention a few. Day-to-day social policy has an impact on the lives we live. It is important because in one way or another we are all interdependent. The structure of society plays a big role in enhancing or at least maintaining individual and collective welfare. Without effective social policies, the standard of living is significantly reduced.

It is important that all social policies consider all members of society, everybody matters, in-particular those individuals that can be considered disadvantaged in the means to access resources and services in order to provide equal opportunity for all. Social policy is relevant throughout the whole life cycle from birth; engaged with healthcare and public services, through childhood and adolescence with the addition of education and resources within the community which develops throughout adulthood until death. Social policy has a variety of concepts each of which has its own ideologies. Ideologies are perspectives that research, evaluate, theorize, and prescribe social policy. These ideologies influence the kinds of social policies we get.

The core ideologies considered in social policy are; Social Democracy, Socialism, Conservatism, Postmodernism, Neo-liberalism, and Feminism. The nature of social policy means it will constantly challenge and critique ideologies, particularly where they threaten to undermine active citizenship. Social policy is a broad concept and it is important that all policies are inclusive. There is a continual need to explore, update and reform policy to ensure welfare possibilities for individuals and families within their communities and wider society. Contemporary issues of ill health, housing, unemployment, poor education, inequality, poverty, and crime are all key considerations in social policy on local and global levels. Globally nations work as a collective to address heavyweight social and political issues raised.

World leaders meet to discuss these contemporary issues, setting objectives and targets to enhance social wellbeing and reduce inequalities and injustices. The government is responsible for the distribution of funding and allows local authorities to decide how to divide funds and implement strategies between all public services under policy, legislation, and guidelines produced by the government.

The Claim

In 2017, the Trump Administration’s Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) overturned the ban on the use of chlorpyrifos, which was its own proposed decision two years before. In 2014, EPA revised the human health risk assessment of chlorpyrifos and offered evidence on the harmful effects of this pesticide on children’s health. Based on these findings, in 2015, EPA proposed to revoke all tolerances for chlorpyrifos and cancel all registrations for it since ‘the agency is unable to conclude that the risk from aggregate exposure from the use of chlorpyrifos meets the safety standard of section 408(b)(2) of the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (FFDCA).’ At this time, this environmental policy seemed to be viable and reasonable since chlorpyrifos is a toxic nerve agent pesticide that is proven to impair brain development in children, damage cognitive function among adults, and harm the environment and wildlife. Under the FFDCA, EPA is responsible for establishing maximum residue limits on food items. Since Trump assumed office in 2017, EPA has been blamed for supporting the harmful decisions of the new administration.

In response to the EPA’s decision to overturn the ban on chlorpyrifos, the American Association of Pediatrics (AAP), whose mission is to ‘attain optimal physical, mental, and social health and well-being for all infants, children, adolescents, and young adults,’ and the EPA scientists disagreed with the proposal of EPA’s leadership. AAP supported the ban, stating that ‘EPA has no basis to allow continued use of chlorpyrifos, and its insistence on doing so puts all children at risk.’ Meanwhile, the EPA scientists disagreed with the leadership’s decision to allow the use of chlorpyrifos on fruits, vegetables, nuts, and crops since they have been studying this pesticide for decades and have found its potential to cause harm to children and young adults. Regardless of resistance, EPA Administrator, Scott Pruitt, claimed that ‘By reversing the previous administration’s steps to ban one of the most widely used pesticides in the world, we are returning to using sound science in decision-making – rather than predetermined results.’ Pruitt’s claim is intended to show that using chlorpyrifos in agriculture is not a serious environmental problem that is not in need of a solution. Since there are a lot of opposing perspectives to the 2017 decision of EPA, deconstructing Scott Pruitt’s claim to identify hidden bias, advocacy over the inquiry, incomplete claims, quality of evidence, and the presence of systems thinking is critical to determine the credibility of the claim.

Where to Begin

Examining my own bias is necessary for beginning the deconstruction analysis of EPA’s claim. As a person who is deeply concerned with the protection of the environment, I believe that chlorpyrifos should be banned from use at least across the United States since it harms not only the environment and wildlife but also has an adverse effect on the brain development of children and young adults. I was drawn to EPA’s claim about the overturn of the ban on chlorpyrifos due to my distrust of the current President’s Administration. The author of the claim, Scott Pruitt, is an experienced American lawyer and Republican politician who served as the EPA Administrator from 2017 to 2018 and was nominated by Trump. Before that, Scott Pruitt occupied such important positions as Attorney General of Oklahoma and the Republican Attorneys General Association; that is why he should have been regarded as competent in environmental initiatives and law.

However, his reputation tells about the opposite since he is known for being corrupt and destroying the foundations of EPA by ‘firing scientists and replacing them with industry lobbyists; undoing critical regulations that protect our air and water; and favoring industry interests over public health.’ There is a clear mismatch between Scott Pruitt’s expertise and claim because after occupying such important posts and enacting regulations, he said that the use of chlorpyrifos in agriculture is sound science. Thus, Scott Pruitt’s argument is a clear example of support for the Trump administration’s reversed course on banning chlorpyrifos and advocacy against the findings of EPA scientists and AAP about the harmful effects of the chemical on the environment, wildlife, and human health.

Who Can You Trust?

In reviewing EPA’s claim for potential bias, it is necessary to assess the author’s interest in the topic. Mr. Pruitt is a strong supporter of the Trump Administration and is close to industry lobbyists; thus, he can be interested in “making policy decisions to boost profits and prevent regulation, often at the expense of the health and well-being of citizens and the environment.” He served as the EPA Administrator only for one year and has been blamed for numerous misconducts regarding environmental laws. In addition to that, Mr. Pruiit’s decision was not justified in the claim since he relied on general phrases and criticism against the Obama administration that banned chlorpyrifos in 2015 based on finding potential harms. Therefore, Mr. Pruitt seems to have a one-sided ideological perspective that is conducive to biased positions and may not genuinely be an expert on the effects of chlorpyrifos on the environment, wildlife, and children’s health.

Does the Structure of the Claim Justify Conclusion?

A type of analytical structure of the claim can say much about its completeness indeed. The author did not justify his claim regarding the allowed use of chlorpyrifos in agriculture and did not back up his claim with research findings or opinions of EPA scientists. In fact, it seems at least illogical to make a decision to allow the use of chlorpyrifos across the United States if EPA researchers’ studies have found that it has had a negative impact on the environment, including drinking water, crops, and air. No other person or organization supported Mr. Pruitt’s decision. Instead, the EPA scientists, AAP, initiators of a Chesapeake Bay Program, and the National Marine Fisheries Service all advocate against the use of this chemical in agriculture since it contaminated drinking water, crops, and air near treated fields.

The first part of the claim seems to criticize the regulation of the Obama administration rather than provide a sound decision. Mr. Pruitt relies on the fact that chlorpyrifos is a widely used chemical all around the world and calls this trend a sound science. In reality, the studies show that chlorpyrifos has harmful ecological effects. Thus, Scott Pruitt’s claim cannot be considered a common-sense environmental policy because it goes against sound science, is not grounded in scientific principles, and looks like advocacy for agricultural producers and pesticide manufacturers, who are the primary stakeholder of this decision and potential winners. The decision would not have a significant economic impact on small businesses since EPA has determined that ‘less than 39,000 of the 1.2 million small farms nationwide, or approximately 3% of all small farms, may be impacted by this proposed revocation.’ However, the general public does not trust EPA’s reports since there is an opinion that the American company Dow Chemical influenced the EPA to make such a decision by giving ‘$1 million to fund President Trump’s inaugural activities.’ Meanwhile, environmentalists are potential losers who would have to cope with the policy’s implications. Hence, the structure of the claim does not justify the conclusion.

Does the Evidence Support Conclusion?

Completeness, currency, and credibility of the evidence are challenged within this claim since the author presented no real proof that chlorpyrifos is not harmful to the environment. The EPA’s own scientists found “no level of chlorpyrifos in food and water that can be considered safe” and recommended to terminate all agricultural use of the chemical. Meanwhile, Mr. Pruitt draws from the fact that chlorpyrifos is one of the most widely-used pesticides in food crop agriculture. A Union of Concerned Scientists for a Healthy Planet and Safer Word stated that EPA ignored the scientific evidence on chlorpyrifos and called Mr. Pruitt’s decision politically motivated. In reality, chlorpyrifos contaminates air, water, and food, reduces the spawning productivity of adult and juvenile Atlantic sturgeon, and impacts the brain development of children and young adults. Thus, the author of the claim missed an opportunity to present some evidence of the beneficial use of chlorpyrifos in food crop agriculture.

Does the Claim Show Multidisciplinary Systems Think?

When applying a holistic, systems thinking approach, it becomes clear that Mr. Pruitt’s claim is unreasonable and unjustified. Sound science, which the author mentions in his claim, shows the opposite to the claim because the EPA’s own scientists found that chlorpyrifos is not only harmful to the environment but also impacts other systems such as air and water pollution, human health, and food contamination. What is apparent within this claim is that Mr. Pruitt criticizes the Obama administration’s policies and favors pesticide manufacturers, taking care of their economic growth.

Vague language is used in the claim, including a statement that the decision to overturn a ban was made using sound science. It does not explain what studies or research findings the author meant or what positive impact of the pesticide anybody could find. In addition to that, EPA has never concluded that the commercial use of chlorpyrifos meets the safety standard of section 408(b)(2) of FFDCA since this decision ignored genetic evidence of vulnerable populations, endocrine-disrupting effects, and data regarding cancer risks. Thus, the claim does not show multidisciplinary systems thinking in its nature.

Conclusion

As a result of deconstructing the former EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt’s claim that ‘By reversing the previous administration’s steps to ban one of the most widely used pesticides in the world, we are returning to using sound science in decision-making – rather than predetermined results,’ many weaknesses in the author’s approach have been identified. It is apparent that Mr. Pruitt does not have a deep understanding of the effect of chlorpyrifos on the environment, wildlife, and human health even though he served as the EPA Administrator for one year. He failed to consider the EPA’s own scientists’ findings when making his claim. As it often occurs, environmental policy-making has appeared to be vulnerable to political impacts since Mr. Pruitt’s decision was not justified but rather politically motivated. If Mr. Pruitt had backed up his assertion with scientific evidence, it could have been a more defensible and credible claim.

The No Zero Grading Policy Hurts Students

“The grade you get is the grade you’ve earned.” Most of us have heard this phrase is high school, probably as you were desperately trying to convince your teacher to bump your grade. Some may have taken this with a grain of salt, others may have taken this phrase as a motivator. With that said, it leads us to ask ourselves, is the grade you get really the grade you’ve earned? Well, with the introduction to “No Zero” grading policies into high schools I’m more than inclined to say no. Students are not getting the grade they’ve earned, just the grade they’ve been handed.

For those who have long forgotten their high school years and haven’t heard the term “No Zero Grading Policy”, lets enlighten you. In recent years more and more high school systems are starting to adapt this “No Zero Grading Policy”. This grading policy makes it impossible for students to be given a score of less than fifty percent on any given assignment, regardless of completion, effort, or academic ability. The policy essentially makes the percentage zero through forty-nine nonexistent.

Why is this such a big deal? Many of you may be asking yourself. Well, this is a big deal because high school is a student’s preparation not only for college but for the real world and life. High school is your demo version, your free trial so to say at life and the real world. In college there is no fifty percent as the lowest score, you can’t turn in an assignment and expect to get half credit on it. We are setting up high school students to fail, they can’t succeed if we keep handicapping them. The No Zero grading policy is affecting their future in many ways. Colleges are now starting to not accept students who come from a No Zero grading policy high school regardless of their GPA because it is not an accurate reflection of their academic ability. So, for the kids that took high school seriously and studied hard, day in and day out you can say goodbye to those dreams of Princeton or Harvard.

Now you may argue that the No Zero grading policy is a part of the “No child left behind” initiative and that its actually helping students who learn at slower paces, are troubled some, or have family issues outside of school. Now as all that may seem true, we really must ask ourselves here, is this the right thing to do? Is inflating their grades really the best way to help these kids that need a little bit more help than some of the other children? Handing out free grades to students may make it seem like we are helping them but what happens when they graduate from high school and they don’t have someone leaning over their shoulder anymore helping them along. No one is going to give them a paycheck for not showing up to work let alone for not doing half of their job.

A high school teacher, Gina Caneva from (March 2014) Catalyst Chicago, says ”It is a terrible lesson to teach any student that it is okay to be lazy. Lowering academic expectations will only hurt our students in the long run.” As a high school teacher Ms. Caneva witnesses first-hand what the policy is doing to these students, her best interest is in her students and she, like many other teachers, feels the students need help but they also feel that this is not the way to help them. Ms. Caneva also states that “parents can be allies. During parent-teacher conferences, they were put off by the no-zero policy. Many parents felt students should receive zeros if they didn’t do work and that receiving a grade of fifty percent instead is not giving students a real consequence.” No one thinks the no-zero policy will actually help or benefit that children in any way, not the parents, not the teachers and even some students them self, know that this is actually hurting them not helping them. So, then who actually thinks the no-zero policy is a good thing you might ask. The few who think this policy is beneficial are the school board members and administration, the people don’t interact directly with the students on the day to day basis. Now why would the board members and administration believe so strongly in a policy when their teachers don’t? Well, according to “The Education Digest” schools and school systems are graded on something called the freshman on track rate this is the statistic that shows what percentage of high school freshman students are on track to graduate within four years. According to Ms. Caneva after one year of having the no-zero policy, many teachers wanted to reverse the policy because they thought it was hurting the students. Ms. Caneva states, “the administration wouldn’t allow it, why would they when the freshman on-track rate had increased nearly thirty percent”. That may seem like a positive statistic but in actuality, it’s not accurate compared to that of schools that do not have a no zero policy.

In a study conducted by Janelle Dennis (August 2018), she found that “high school teachers are struggling to motivate students who have attended a middle school with a no-zero policy in place”. Janelle also found that these students from no zero-grading policy middle schools show signs of “learned helplessness”. Seligman’s theory of learned helplessness (1976) is the theoretical framework for Janelle Dennis’ study. Janelle’s study suggests and shows that students who attend a no zero grading policy school have lower core class (Science, English, and Mathematics) grades compared to those students who attend schools that give zeros as a grade.

There is more than enough evidence that not only suggests but proves the fact beyond a reasonable doubt that no zero grading policies among all school levels have immediate and long-term effects not only on the grade of the students but also on their everyday ambition, motivation, and demeanor. The only real reason this policy is still in school and is still growing is due to what could be called the failure of the school systems and administration to sufficiently and adequately motivate and prepare their students for classes, exams, and what’s beyond their schooling. The no zero grading policy is a lazy attempt by the administration to prove to the school board that the school is preforming at minimal required performance. There were, what seemed like pros about this grading policy, but the pros still hurt the students in the long run. The cons obviously outweigh the pros, but these policies are still being implemented into middle and high schools everywhere. The no zero grading policy is a tumor that will keep growing and keep hurting the students of the schools it infects.

Work Cited:

1. Caneva, G. (2014, March 8). For students’ sake, say no to the ‘No-Zero Policy’ on grading. Retrieved from https://www.chicagoreporter.com/students-sake-say-no-no-zero-policy-grading/.
2. Dennis, J. (2018, August). No-Zero Policy in Middle School: A Comparison of High … Retrieved October 2019, from https://scholarworks.waldenu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=6973&context=dissertations.
3. Seligman, M. E. (1976, March). Learned helplessness: Theory and evidence. Retrieved October 2019, from https://psycnet.apa.org/record/1976-20159-001.

What if you are traveling overnight by train during the time we are switching our clocks back an hour? You will probably be stuck in a train station an hour longer than you expected. Amtrak trains have a scheduled time to run by, so in October when we change the clocks back by one hour, all trains stop at 2:00 am and wait for the hour before they resume their scheduled trips. Come March’s time change, they will probably be behind schedule with one hour, but that is alright because we all know: that when Amtrak is late, they are actually on time!

The tricky problem of Daylight Saving Time comes, depending on each country’s current laws, every Spring (March or April) and every Fall (October or November). Although some people agree that changing hours will save energy, more studies have been done to prove has a negative impact on our health.

Daylight Saving Time was first proposed in 1895 by a New Zealand entomologist named George Vernon Hudson, but his idea did not come to life. Then, in 1907, William Willett, a British builder proposed to add 20 minutes to each Sunday in April, and to cut them back on each of the Sundays in September (Downing, 2005). He loved horseback riding and he wanted to have more time during the day to practice his hobby. He tried to lobby his idea around Great Britain and along with more recreational opportunities, Willett argued that this would lower lighting costs. In July 1908, Thunder Bay in Ontario, Canada became the first city in the world to use Daylight Saving Time (DST). Years later, the first European country to adopt the summertime was Germany on April 30, 1916, during the First World War. The UK (where the tradition is called Summer Time), Belgium, Denmark, France, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Sweden, Turkey and Tasmania followed. The United States followed 2 years later when the law “An act to preserve daylight and provide standard time, for the United States” was enacted on March 19, 1918 (United States. Congress. Senate. Committee on Interstate Commerce, 1918). Today, 70 countries around the world are using this mechanism (www.webexhibits.org).

According to the Time Zone Convention, watches all over the world show the same minute and second for each point on Earth, but the difference in hours is given by the fact that every 15 degrees of longitude gives an extra hour. So, it was decided that the time would be advanced one hour ahead of Greenwich Time. The countries around the Equator have 12 hours equally in the daytime and nighttime, so they do not have a need to observe Daylight Saving Time. Compared with that, the Northern and Southern hemisphere countries have longer days and shorter nights, and it was agreed that gaining an hour during the summertime will help with the tourism industry. This industry has welcomed the shift to the summertime, arguing that one extra hour of natural light makes people spend more time on the streets, spending more money on activities such as festivals, shopping, and concerts (www.webexhibits.org).

The main reason for introducing and maintaining summertime has been, and still is, closely related to energy saving, especially for electric lighting, because all activities are done better during the day when the sun is up. There is a consensus that summertime contributes to a reduction in electricity demand during the peak hours of the evening, but this can be ‘offset’ by an increase in demand in the morning when we wake up in the dark. Also, summertime arguments claim that more natural light can counteract or prevent power outages and other electrical failures, influencing people to spend more time outside the house and, therefore, use fewer household appliances. Michael Downing, a professor at Tufts University in Boston, and author of Spring Forward: The Annual Madness of Daylight Saving Time (2009), argues energy saving is wrong because if the demand for electricity decreases, gas usage will increase, and in the end, there would be no energy saved.

Many people have the impression that summertime has been introduced for farmers. But the problem is that especially cow farmers are against the change of time, both in spring and fall, because it changes the cow’s milking time. Cows like routine and their comfort zone is disturbed by the time changing. The first week after the time change, cows are kept on the same schedule and the process of changing their schedules starts with 30-minute increments over 2 days (www.americandairy.com).

In addition to the few benefits of the time change, it seems that the balance tends to leverage the negative effects it generates. Many studies have highlighted the reasons why switching to summertime is unnecessary and has a negative impact on our health.

Experts warn that any change is a stressful factor for the body. Switching itself to the summertime is an effort that the body can adapt relatively easily, but this also depends on the physical and mental particularities of each body, because our daily routine can be overwhelmed with the change. Physicians think that people need about a week to adapt to the summertime because they need to wake up an hour earlier than they got used to (Kantermann, Juda, Merrow, & Roenneberg, 2007). For those who suffer from certain health problems, the effects of changing the biological rhythm could be more serious. Of course, it is a matter of accommodation that can take a few days or a few weeks, depending on each person, but it remains a major problem.

It seems that the human body cannot adapt easily to the summertime and it influences our biological clock, according to the study reported in Current Biology (2007) by experts from Ludwig-Maximilians University of Munich. They warned that this effect is more pronounced for people who are used to waking up early in the morning. Changing the time can disrupt the biological clock, and hormonal disturbances can occur, especially regarding melatonin, the hormone responsible for regulating the biological clock of the body.

An interesting thing that emerges from DTS is the increase in traffic accidents. Although there are also opinions that the number of accidents would diminish when we change the time because we drive more during the daylight, studies have shown that the weekend after the summer shift shows an increase in those accidents. People have just lost an hour of sleep, and they become more jerky, tired, and therefore more inattentive. Prats-Uribe, Tobías and Prieto-Alhambra (2017) showed that “DST changes are associated with a cost of 1.5 lives every year due to road traffic accidents” (pg.2). The findings from their study were inconclusive, with results suggesting that shifting light by adjusting time can have positive or negative road safety consequences, which requires more research to be done specially for the long term effect of DTS (2 or more weeks after the time changing and not only the weekend after).

The week after the Daylight Changing Time is the base for a lot of medical studies all over the world. In one of these studies published in Sleep Medicine, Sipilä, Ruuskanen, Rautava, and Kyoto, looked at 10 years of data and concluded that Daylight Saving Time increases the risk of ischemic stroke by 8% during the first two days after the transition (2016). In another study done by Janszky and Ljung in 2008 and published in the New England Journal of Medicine, they explain that “the effect of the spring transition to daylight saving time on the incidence of acute myocardial infarction was somewhat more pronounced in women than in men, and the autumn effect was more pronounced in men than in women (pg.1)”.

Why is this tradition increasing the risk of men committing suicide within a few weeks after summer (Berk, Dodd, Hallam, Berk, Gleeson & Henry, 2008) Or why changing hours can affect mental health in extreme cases? The unusual change of the hour raises the circadian rhythm, which reduces the body’s ability to cope with stress and shocks. Switching to summertime may trigger a decrease in alertness and even fatigue. In fact, it’s somewhat logical, that the unusual change of the hour raises the circadian rhythm, which reduces the body’s ability to cope with stress and shocks. Research has continued and has revealed increasing stress levels in terms of losing one hour of sleep, continuing with the difficulty of concentration and learning that we face at work/school (Berk et al., 2008).

By invoking the unjustified disturbance of the population health, and that losses in various socio-economic areas outweigh the gains, some countries have given up the change of winter-summer time or have never applied it. The European Commission has recently proposed to abandon Daylight Saving Time for Europe, starting in 2019. All the member countries of the Commission have the freedom to decide, until April of 2019, if they wish to apply in the summer or winter time. Economist William F. Shughart estimated the cost of Daylight Saving Time, and in 2008 he realized that this tradition costs the United States $1.7 billion per year (Shughart II, 2008).

The State of Washington’s Senators have filed a law this year asking to keep their winter time permanently (Honeyford, Hunt, Van de Wege, Fortunato, & Pedersen, 2019). The law argues that “research has shown that changing to and from Daylight Saving Time twice per year has negative impacts on public health, increases traffic accidents and crime, disrupts agriculture scheduling, and hinders economic growth” (par 2). If approved, it will allow the state of Washington to remain in Daylight Saving Time year-round, joining other states and territories that currently observe Daylight Saving Time year-round (Hawaii, American Samoa, Guam, the Minor Outlying Islands, the Northern Mariana Islands, Puerto Rico, U.S. Virgin Islands, and Arizona, except for Navarro Tribe) (www.webexhibits.org).

Daylight Saving Time does affect our health and if we keep or not the summertime forever, only time will decide.

Contemporarily there are many global issues that are affecting the citizens of the world as a single community; disrupting natural framework and disturbing the social and economic progress. The unavailability or inadequate access to clean water is one of them. It is also termed as water crisis in the global standards. There is scarcity of freshwater due to depleting sources and contamination of clean water. India, a giant nation which is home to approximately 103 billion people is also suffering from water crisis. In June 2018, the Government of India (GOI) reported that the country “…is suffering from the worst water crisis in its history and millions of lives and livelihoods are under threat” (NITI Aayog, 2018, p.15). The governments have launched various schemes and made new policies to curb the problem. Despite the efforts of the Indian Government, the situation (threat) pertains which is implied as failure of government schemes because of unorganized infrastructures and declining economics. This essay argues that despite the government efforts; the problem of water crisis is not reducing and stress the need to emphasize on producing better policies for results in actual.

The lack of attention by the government in implementing effective and structured policies on time has been underlined as the main reason behind the worsening of crisis. There is also ignorance to the fact that the ground water level is lowering largely due to exploitation by companies like coca cola in several parts of India. There are millions of farmers in India who are withdrawing tons of water and contaminating soil and water by the use of insecticides and pesticides. It is considered a failure of government; being unable to put a halt on such practices by not providing effective organic alternatives to farmers or imposing strict laws. There is Government policies are based on incorrect data .e.g. Mahir Shah Committee diagnosis. Hence when the real data is not known the actual issue cannot be solved; the problems pertain. Facilities created by Indian government are also not properly maintained. Moreover industrial effluent standards are not enforced because the state pollution control boards have inadequate technical and human resources.”

According to a report of the National Bureau of Asian Research, Washington, USA, there is insufficient and delay of funding in water-purifying in urban areas. Most of the rivers in India consist of undrinkable water, and sometimes not even fit for bathing. The government of India had launched the Ganga action plan in 1984 aiming to clean the Ganges River in a 25 year period, but it was proved out to be unsuccessful as in many places the river was contaminated with a high coli count. Maintenance of the treatment facilities is also not proper. This shows the shortcomings of the government in planning and executing a scheme. As per statement of Brooks (2007), “the tragedy of India’s water scarcity is that the crisis could have been largely avoided with better water management practices.” So the solution to this crisis is to change water management practices by regulating usage with effective legislation and proper screening and analyzing the results with schedule.

In this article, M Dinesh Kumar states the recommendation made by the Mihir Shah committee for surface and groundwater management. The author uses the data from articles and reports of international research institutes and government of India reports to describe that the statistics are based on outdated concepts. His report focuses mainly on the statistics on the irrigation water usage. This research has been useful for my research as it clearly states the flaws in statistics and diagnosis that are to be used in policy making by the Government. Although this article will not form the basis of my research, it will be useful supplementary for my research on flaws in water policies on water crisis.

In this article, Dr. S. Patnayak is stating out of India perspective about the water issue in India based on the reports of the international research institutes including UNICEF. The author targets to address the inability of India to reverse the increasing water crisis due to its ineffective water management practices and legislation. The author also compares the trends of water usage and extraction of groundwater between India and US. This article is useful for my topic as it states the fact that Indian law has virtually no legislation on groundwater. This article provides the information based on the facts that helps me explain my views.

In this article, Dr. S. Patnayak uses the references from the article imminent water crisis in India by Brooks N to state governments’ role in this crisis. The author accuses the Government of Indian of lack attention in various aspects towards tackling water crisis which could have been avoided beforehand. The article is very useful in my topic as particularly states the faults in water management practices. The article clearly holds the government accountable for worsening of water crisis which is my topic.